# blue line (blogs) — RSS Amplifier Recent posts from the 2 feeds in the RSS Amplifier directory that cover blue line. Page: Feed: --- ## [Chicago is about to spend millions on a new parking garage and nothing on transit at The 78](https://www.stevencanplan.com/2026/07/chicago-is-about-to-spend-millions-on-a-new-parking-garage-and-nothing-on-transit-at-the-78/) _2026-07-10 · Steven Vance · Steven Can Plan_ This week I asked my alderperson to defer the finance committee’s vote on a massive funding package that would have the city own a parking garage while at the same time making zero investments in transit. Dear Alderperson Conway, I think it’s prudent and appropriate if you would, as Finance Committee Vice Chair, to defer \[…\] ## [The Girl and the Baton](https://myredsneakers.substack.com/p/the-girl-and-the-baton) _2026-07-06 · Linda Spencer · My Red Sneakers_ Under the stars in Bordeaux, a conductor handed a little girl her baton. What happened next is something I will never forget. ## [Still Dancing in the Living Room](https://myredsneakers.substack.com/p/still-dancing-in-the-living-room) _2026-06-29 · Linda Spencer · My Red Sneakers_ Ella Fitzgerald almost danced at the Apollo and then sang instead and made history. My aunt's song to me as a kid taught me why that leap matters. ## [A Love Letter to a Country That Isn’t Mine](https://myredsneakers.substack.com/p/a-love-letter-to-a-country-that-isnt) _2026-06-22 · Linda Spencer · My Red Sneakers_ On Greece: a borrowed culture, an honorary etera, magpies that mate for life, and standing humbled in the shadow of everything it gave the world. ## [Camille Claudel, Rodin's Muse, Vanished for Thirty Years](https://myredsneakers.substack.com/p/camille-claudel-rodins-muse-vanished) _2026-06-15 · Linda Spencer · My Red Sneakers_ Camille Claudel didn't lose her mind—she lost her name. Auguste Rodin's muse, erased for 30 years as an "inconvenience." ## [Built in 1912, banned in 1957: the courtyard homes at the Damen station](https://www.stevencanplan.com/2026/06/built-in-1912-banned-in-1957-the-courtyard-homes-at-the-damen-station/) _2026-06-11 · Steven Vance · Steven Can Plan_ Finding an affordable home near the Brown Line in Ravenswood is hard. Not having enough homes to rent or buy creates cutthroat competition and drives up prices — wait lists for apartments, offers over asking for anyone trying to buy. The retail and day care workers who serve this neighborhood face the same shortage as \[…\] ## [Sobremesa: The Art of Not Leaving](https://myredsneakers.substack.com/p/sobremesa-the-art-of-not-leaving) _2026-06-08 · Linda Spencer · My Red Sneakers_ That night, nobody wanted to go home. Here's why sobremesa, the Spanish art of lingering after a meal, might be exactly what many are missing. ## [Chicago’s Protecting Renters Ordinance would create the rental registry the city needs](https://www.stevencanplan.com/2026/06/chicagos-protecting-renters-ordinance-would-create-the-rental-registry-the-city-needs/) _2026-06-05 · Steven Vance · Steven Can Plan_ Update July 15, 2026: Mayor Johnson introduced the Protecting Renters Ordinance as number O2026-0026554 on June 29, 2026. Today, City That Works wrote about the pros and cons and potential positive and negative impacts of the proposed legislation. I’ve written twice about why Chicago should have a rental registry — first proposing a kludge using \[…\] ## [Two Blue Lines and a Yellow Streak](https://myredsneakers.substack.com/p/two-blue-lines-and-a-yellow-streak) _2026-06-01 · Linda Spencer · My Red Sneakers_ Punished for sloppy handwriting. Silenced by a D in art. Decades later, a tiny canvas and two blue lines changed a person's perspective about what was possible. ## [Diamonds, Volcanoes, and the Art of Survival](https://myredsneakers.substack.com/p/diamonds-volcanoes-and-the-art-of) _2026-05-25 · Linda Spencer · My Red Sneakers_ She fled revolutions, painted power, and wore her escape on her wrists. Tamara de Lempicka survived everything, including being forgotten. ## [Meet Claude, the AI assistant (Sponsored)](https://crawlproof.com/a/v4g8TlksDEKd) _2026-05-25 · **Sponsored**_ Conversational AI to answer questions, brainstorm ideas, and help with tasks. ## [BUILD would legalize pocket neighborhoods across Illinois](https://www.stevencanplan.com/2026/05/build-would-legalize-pocket-neighborhoods-across-illinois/) _2026-05-21 · Steven Vance · Steven Can Plan_ BUILD fact of the day: The plan includes a middle housing component that would allow cottage clusters, courtyard buildings, and pocket neighborhoods across the state. A pocket neighborhood with 12 homes broke ground in Evanston this year. The rest of Illinois has most likely never seen one built in decades. The BUILD plan would change \[…\] [Listen](https://www.stevencanplan.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/05/urbanecoongrant.mp4) ## [The Art We Lose](https://myredsneakers.substack.com/p/the-art-we-lose) _2026-05-18 · Linda Spencer · My Red Sneakers_ Picasso's genius is preserved forever. So why does a little girl walk through a museum and sense, even before she can say it, that something is missing? ## [Whose Art Gets on the Walls](https://myredsneakers.substack.com/p/whose-art-gets-on-the-walls) _2026-05-11 · Linda Spencer · My Red Sneakers_ A light show in Provence, a genius in an asylum, a young woman who signs her name in the back of the canvas. The question is: whose art gets on the walls? ## [My testimony to the Illinois House’s executive community in favor of the BUILD plan](https://www.stevencanplan.com/2026/05/my-testimony-to-the-illinois-houses-executive-community-in-favor-of-the-build-plan/) _2026-05-06 · Steven Vance · Steven Can Plan_ Today the Illinois House executive committee is having a subject matter hearing about Gov. Pritzker’s BUILD plan, which was introduced to the House by Rep. Kam Buckner as HB5626. Because the oral testimony list for today’s meeting was getting too long I was asked to submit my testimony in writing instead. Thank you for inviting \[…\] ## [The Professor Who Gave Me the Romantics](https://myredsneakers.substack.com/p/the-professor-who-gave-me-the-romantics) _2026-05-04 · Linda Spencer · My Red Sneakers_ I failed my first test and it changed my life. One professor, one bad grade, and suddenly Lord Byron became a shadow I'd carry for decades. ## [Inside the machine: visiting the O’Brien Water Reclamation Plant](https://www.stevencanplan.com/2026/05/inside-the-machine-visiting-the-obrien-water-reclamation-plant/) _2026-05-03 · Steven Can Plan_ Half of all the electricity consumed at one of the largest wastewater treatment facilities in the Midwest goes to running air blowers and pumps. That was the detail that stuck with me most from Saturday’s open house at the Terrence J. O’Brien Water Reclamation Plant at the corner of Howard Street and McCormick Boulevard in \[…\] ## [Chicago’s ten co-living buildings, circa 2019](https://www.stevencanplan.com/2026/05/chicagos-ten-co-living-buildings-circa-2019/) _2026-05-01 · Steven Vance · Steven Can Plan_ This is adapted from a piece I originally wrote for the MAP Strategies blog in January 2019, when I was consulting for them. The original is gone from their site but lives on in the Wayback Machine. I’m republishing it here because the inventory is a useful snapshot of where Chicago’s co-living market stood at \[…\] ## [A day in Springfield with Abundant Housing Illinois](https://www.stevencanplan.com/2026/04/a-day-in-springfield-with-abundant-housing-illinois/) _2026-04-20 · Steven Vance · Steven Can Plan_ Earlier this month I made the trip down to Springfield to volunteer with Abundant Housing Illinois, an advocacy organization pushing for more housing options across the state. It was our biggest group ever, with 39 people going from five Illinois municipalities, and most of us took Amtrak there and back. The day was a mix \[…\] ## [Comparing Illinois and Netherlands agriculture sectors](https://www.stevencanplan.com/2026/04/comparing-illinois-and-netherlands-agriculture-sectors/) _2026-04-20 · Steven Vance · Steven Can Plan_ The Netherlands has about 5 million more people than Illinois, yet fits into a fraction of the land area. Both places take agriculture seriously. So how do they compare? I started pulling numbers in August 2022 (which I posted in a Twitter thread) and the gap was striking. Illinois agriculture generates more than $19 billion \[…\] ## [Reflection on volunteering for Drake Warren’s campaign](https://www.stevencanplan.com/2026/03/reflection-on-volunteering-for-drake-warrens-campaign/) _2026-03-16 · Steven Vance · Steven Can Plan_ Updated March 20: Drake won the race on Tuesday and is now the Democratic nominee in November, where he does not currently face a challenger. He gave the following statement to the Chicago Tribune: “This campaign was shaped by the hands of hundreds of people who made our victory possible,” Warren said in an emailed \[…\] ## [Watch Chovy Code Live (Sponsored)](https://crawlproof.com/a/7B2pqQUMj5yX) _2026-03-16 · **Sponsored**_ Join live coding streams with real-time collaborative screen sharing, open source and free. ## [Chicago crash data updated to show monetary damages based on a person’s situation in the crash](https://www.stevencanplan.com/2026/02/chicago-crash-data-updated-to-show-monetary-damages-based-on-a-persons-situation-in-the-crash/) _2026-02-27 · Steven Vance · Steven Can Plan_ The Chicago Crashes page that is hosted on Chicago Cityscape shows weekly and year-to-date crash statistics along with estimated costs of those crashes, broken down by person type. Today I published a major change to present the stats better, in a way that matches the costs of the crash that are said to be different \[…\] ## [A Claude Code skill to find relevant parts of someone’s speech in a video](https://www.stevencanplan.com/2026/02/a-claude-code-skill-to-find-relevant-parts-of-someones-speech-in-a-video/) _2026-02-23 · Steven Vance · Steven Can Plan_ Political speeches, candidate interviews, and public hearings contain dozens of quotable moments — but finding them means scrubbing through hours of video. I created a Claude Code skill that helps me speed up the process of finding the right section of a speech. The skill, called speech-clip-extractor, takes a video file and a set of \[…\] ## [Okay, 2026 should be the year Illinois lawmakers do something about the housing shortage](https://www.stevencanplan.com/2026/02/okay-2026-should-be-the-year-illinois-lawmakers-do-something-about-the-housing-shortage/) _2026-02-19 · Steven Vance · Steven Can Plan_ Governor JB Pritzker announced his plan to address the state’s housing shortage in 2026. This is the third year in a row I’ve written about proposed legislation to unlock new housing in Illinois, and this should be the year – the governor and General Assembly leadership are fully aligned since they, together, introduced bills cover \[…\] ## [Choosing NITA board members: it needs the best people](https://www.stevencanplan.com/2026/02/choosing-nita-board-members-it-needs-the-best-people/) _2026-02-02 · Steven Vance · Steven Can Plan_ It’s super important to the success of the forthcoming Northern Illinois Transit Authority (NITA, pronounced “neat-uh”) that is has new board members who are forward-thinking, collaborative, and invested in high-quality transit service. Collaboration is almost an inherently necessary trait, as 17 of the 20 new board members will also serve on either the Pace, Metra, \[…\] [Listen](https://www.stevencanplan.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/02/NITA.mov) ## [I’ve been composting using the city’s food scrap dropoff program for two years now](https://www.stevencanplan.com/2026/01/ive-been-composting-using-the-citys-food-scrap-dropoff-program-for-two-years-now/) _2026-01-19 · Steven Vance · Steven Can Plan_ Data summary: Last month I made the thirteenth trip to a City of Chicago food scrap dropoff site at 1758 S Clark St. After two years I think it’s a good moment to count how long and how often I’ve been dropping off scraps for composting. I started collecting food waste soon after I learned \[…\] ## [Two-flat journal 10: the project has a permit and basement digging has begun](https://www.stevencanplan.com/2025/12/two-flat-journal-10-the-project-has-a-permit-and-basement-digging-has-begun/) _2025-12-11 · Steven Vance · Steven Can Plan_ I don’t feel like explaining the ups and downs of the last six months, which is when my building permit application was resubmitted. I’ll commemorate the occasion by sharing these photos of the new footings that have been excavated. A new steel beam – actually three segments – will be installed in the basement, supported \[…\] ## [How Chicago could maintain its housing affordability status](https://www.stevencanplan.com/2025/12/how-chicago-could-maintain-its-housing-affordability-status/) _2025-12-03 · Steven Vance · Steven Can Plan_ An op-ed by Steffany Bahamon, Jasmine Omeke and Steven Vance (Abundant Housing Illinois co-leads) published in Crain’s Chicago Business. Of all the major cities in the United States, Chicago provides the greatest value, with robust amenities and culture without correlated housing costs. But if Chicago wants to retain that status, some things need to change. \[…\] ## [Reasons why your (a Chicagoan) 2024 property tax bill went up](https://www.stevencanplan.com/2025/11/reasons-why-your-a-chicagoan-2024-property-tax-bill-went-up/) _2025-11-19 · Steven Vance · Steven Can Plan_ The second and final installment property tax bill for 2024 was mailed to Cook County property owners on Friday, November 14. Social media was abuzz as many people opened their mail (or checked the Treasurer’s website) and found a big increase in their annual property tax bill. Multiple news reports described how some communities in \[…\] ## [Illinois’s new energy act could facilitate geothermal heating for housing](https://www.stevencanplan.com/2025/11/illinoiss-new-energy-act-could-facilitate-geothermal-heating-for-housing/) _2025-11-10 · Steven Vance · Steven Can Plan_ When I learned that the Clean & Reliable Grid Affordability (CRGA) Act, passed by the Illinois legislature on October 30, would fund geothermal networks for heating and cooling homes my first thought was a proposal from 2023 to build geothermal wells in Chicago alleys that adjacent property owners could tap into. This is useful because \[…\] ## [Real SIMs for AI Agents (Sponsored)](https://crawlproof.com/a/OaOe5nZw4G1c) _2025-11-10 · **Sponsored**_ Pass 2FA and verifications with real carrier numbers via our API. ## [Illinois legislature adopts People Over Parking Act to ban parking mandates in transit-served areas](https://www.stevencanplan.com/2025/10/illinois-legislature-adopts-people-over-parking-act-to-ban-parking-mandates-in-transit-served-areas/) _2025-10-31 · Steven Vance · Steven Can Plan_ This article has been re-published and expanded on Streetsblog Chicago. Please read that version. At about 4:22 AM this morning the Illinois Senate concurred with the Illinois House on bill SB2111 (PDF), approving a revenues and reform package that will close budget gaps and provide additional funding for the state’s 63 transit agencies. Among the \[…\]